German Patent No. 37 25 860 A1 describes a power circuit-breaker having a contact arrangement including a movable contact member arranged on a rotatable contact arm and a stationary contact member, with a stop being provided to limit the movement of the contact arm in opening the movable contact member. When the contact arm has reached its end position, the arm is prevented from dropping back into the closed position of the contact arrangement by a suitable mechanical gripping device. One disadvantage of such a switching device is that there is the risk when opening the contact arrangement that the contact arm might be thrown back by the stop, especially at high switching capacities, before the mechanical gripping device is operative, so the contact arrangement is unintentionally closed again. There are switching devices, where the stop is provided with a damping layer, so some of the impact energy is absorbed. However, it has not been possible previously to prevent recoil of the contact member at a reasonable cost. Instead, the rate of recoil of the contact arm is simply reduced by the damping layer.
French Patent No. 1,048,980 A describes a switching device according to the definition of the species having a contact arrangement having a movable contact member arranged on a contact arm and a stationary contact member, where the switching device includes a stop in the form of a movably arranged braking body that limits the movement of the contact arm in opening the contact arrangement. After impact, the contact arm moves together with the damping buffer belonging to the braking body until it is braked. There is still the risk here that a contact arm striking with a high energy might be thrown back due to the elasticity of the damping buffer made of cured rubber or an equivalent material.